Paramount Aims to Lower the Lowest Bar on Movie Theaters
Lucas Shaw and Thomas Buckley
You know the saying "less is more"? Well, someone needs to tell Paramount that the corollary to that is "more is less" because their strategy right now is "more is more" and it's fucking stupid. In fact, it might sink Hollywood. Or at least, the theatrical business:
Paramount Skydance has agreed to sign contracts with major theater chains guaranteeing that it will release 30 movies a year in cinemas if it acquires Warner Bros. Discovery according to people familiar with the matter.
Paramount has offered three-year agreements to AMC Entertainment and Cineworld Group’s Regal Cinemas, the world’s two largest theater chains, requiring it to release the films exclusively in theaters for at least 45 days, according to the people, who asked to not be identified because the agreements are private. The films would also not be available to stream online for at least 90 days.
On average, Paramount releases about 8 to 9 movies a year. Warner Bros does about 10 to 12. Fingers-and-toes math suggests to me this number combined doesn't add up to 30. Yet somehow they're going to make it add up to 30. And the somehow isn't rocket science, it's a simple lowering of the bar to what should actually be released in theaters.
And it's so stupid because it's the exact opposite of what they should be doing at the exact wrong time to be doing it. Yes, the box office is booming right now, but it's also a (predictable) pent-up fluke of major releases. Most years are not like this and newsflash: most years going forward will not be like this. And even this, relatively speaking, isn't that impressive. These are "record" numbers because of inflation, not because Hollywood has suddenly cracked some code.
So Paramount promising to release 30 movies a year in theaters is just going to lead to... more movies that shouldn't be released in theaters getting released in theaters. And that's going to exacerbate the problems theaters have been facing over the past, I don't know, 50 years or so.
I'm not going to say "shitty" because that's not really even the problem here. It's simply that increasingly, there are types of movies that do well in theaters – yes, big budget blockbusters, but also not always, and also not exclusively – but there are also many types of movies, even excellent movies, that simply don't work in theaters any longer. Sure, you can say that sucks. But it's also reality.
And so not just forcing them into theaters but forcing them there for 45 days is not just silly, it's stupid. It's going to lead not to better box office results but more empty theaters. Obviously.
It's true that Netflix had also committed to the 45 day window to try to win Warner Bros. But the key here is quantity. You could certainly make the case that the best movies should have such an exclusive window in theaters. But you cannot make the case that more movies than ever should. You just can't.
Again, this is so fucking stupid. We all know why Paramount is doing it – to try to seal the deal! But it's so obviously going to backfire that it's almost farcical. Get ready for Dear Santa 2 and 3 and 4 and god knows what else.
Update: Rich Greenfield of LightShed Partners pinged me on my tweet on the matter and points to their report that actually, Paramount and Warner Bros, per the current theatrical scheduling, were already likely above releasing 30 movies next year. Meaning, of course, that David Ellison is making a promise that's easy to keep.
That's interesting, but my only pushback there would be that Paramount is in the middle of ramping production post-Skydance deal while Warner is ramping post-killer box office returns last year (which, by the way, they're not currently replicating this year). Which is to say, I suspect their 2027 slates could be a fluke too and wouldn't expect 30+ movies to the "natural" slate going forward. But it now will be if they merge! Because it's in the contracts! What could go wrong?
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
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